A much calmer take on the vocals, without the autotune effect and stereo double-tracking. I kept this one around because I liked the lighter feel of it. The guitar part is different as well, I felt like even though I was playing the right part, it kind of sounded wrong, which is why I went with the other version.

I’ve never been quite sure where I stole the chorus at the end from but I’m pretty sure it’s been done before. The first half was built onto that, drawing on Guided By Voices for inspiration. Another surprisingly disciplined mix.

At the tail end of my band days I had recorded a demo of this track and always meant to come back to it. Under the “influence” I laid down some overwhelming noises, and had the good sense to come back and edit it the next day. The result is one of my more disciplined mixes.

Yes, I’m using a little of the autotune, but I’m also not using it. It’s called balance.

Around this time I’d started recording some music with a band, and I had found myself unemployed, so I took advantage of all that free time to make an album. It was a concept album only in the sense that I made the whole thing in a short period of time, so it kind of all fit together.

Figured it would be a good album opener. Basically making up the lyrics as I went. This was my “Hey Bulldog.”

This song developed as it went, and gathered meaning in its abstract nature like a snowball rolling downhill. At an epic length of almost six minutes it was our longest track, it kept growing organically until some kind of bizarre feedback-drenched guitar solo came out the other end.

On a bit of a whim, Lee Armstrong and I ended up making a hip hop album in 2002. I had been playing around with making some beats in Reason, but didn’t have much of a direction. We decided to use the equipment and beats that were sitting around to some good use. We recorded over the course of a week, gradually refining our ideas until they coalesced around six tracks.

I had recorded this earlier by myself, but felt that it would be a good fit for a band. It was a lot of fun to play live, and easy enough that I could actually manage it with my limited guitar skills, so it was a mainstay at our shows.

Sunlite was the second song I wrote just for the band we were calling Bootyproof. Having done a poppy rock track earlier with Officially, we were feeling like this was our groove. We had started to play shows, and these tracks anchored the set.

We were both also going through our own relationship issues at the time, and lines like “in the sunlight of your eyes, I found the rain” were inevitable. I remember writing the “vampires of the past” line in tribute to Sparklehorse, whose Sick of Goodbyes song had fantastic lyrics like “no one sees you’re on a vampire planet…” and were so damn good they’d bring me to tears.

The bass line here was so awkward that when I asked RC to play it, he thought I was crazy. “Bill Berry felt the same way about that song on Green,” I told him, to which he responded “Bill Berry ended up not playing that drum part.” Touché.

I joined Stumptown Coffee as the first employee in 1999, and soon started playing music with RC Gartrell. At some point it was decided to record an album in the first location after hours, and we formed a band to contribute a track. We chose the name Bootyproof, because it was funny. 🤔

This was pressed on vinyl and released soon thereafter, marking the only time a song of mine has been released on a record.

The inner dialogue of our conflicted protagonist. Another piece intended as part of a “concept album” which I had actually made a booklet and story to go along with, now lost. Recorded on the same day as Word Is Out.

Two dueling acoustic guitars, two vocals, computer-generated drums and bass… some of the vocals were regrettable but I didn’t save the multitrack, so I was never able to revisit it and give it the love it probably deserved. All the love came later.

Favorite moment is the breakdown at around 1:15. Not sure where that idea came from, I think I came up with a melody and put some chords behind it. My favorite bit there. I revisit this at the end, and it somehow changes from 3/4 time to 4/4 time, so at the point I pretty much felt like I was The Beatles.

My attempt at writing the simplest song possible. As is typical with constraints, I ended up with something more interesting than I had expected. If not for the hideous drum fill, this might have been a contender.

It means “I be money” and that’s the goal. No idea what it meant when I wrote it, just thought it fit its place in the song. Wasn’t entirely convinced as to what I was singing there anyway, just let inspiration run its course.

Falsetto is almost unrecognizable in this track. A chipper Ray singing. Lyrics were taking me where they wanted, or to whomever they wanted, and in this case we ended up in a blind alleyway with a girl called Cindy.

An attempt at writing a song around a theme. Not sure how I got the vocal effect on the four track, but I suspect I panned the vocal to one side and everything else to the other, treating it as a two track and then putting the effect on one side on the computer.

One of my better attempts at four-tracking with an acoustic guitar and a simple song idea. Intended to overdub a horn section in the middle there, but much like with The Who singing “cello” on A Quick One, I just never got around to it.

Kind of more a collection of the sounds I was making in Santa Cruz than anything else. I suspect I’d just discovered Propellerhead’s software. Something like that. But a lot of this is just me playing around with a tape recorder as well.

Before I had access to a multitrack device of any kind, I recorded this with a pair of handheld cassette recorders. It was more or less to prove a technical point, which is my way of saying that it’s completely unlistenable.